Donald Trump Wants a Wall, and He Could Use DACA Recipients as a Bargaining Chip to Get It

Now that President Trump has formally initiated the end of DACA, hundreds of thousands of young people who voluntarily came forward and entrusted their personal information to the government are anxiously wondering if that act, in an unconscionably cruel twist, will earn them a deportation order after their work permits expire. Only a few hours after Attorney General Sessions earnestly explained that the decision wasn't personal and that the president cares deeply about providing a path forward for affected individuals, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders promptly made clear that all the administration's performative hand-wringing was, in fact, a bunch of duplicitous nonsense.

When reporters asked Sanders how the administration arrived at its decision, particularly in light of President Trump's ready reassurances that permit-holders could "rest easy" under his administration, she shrugged and explained that the president's hands are tied, since the program is an unlawful executive usurpation of powers properly confined to the legislature, and that Trump, in good faith, simply could not continue to enforce it. This is, of course, a partisan statement of opinion dishonestly presented as an objective and undisputed fact, but it is necessary for her to generate a phantom conflict between the two branches of government in order for her conclusion to follow: It's up to Congress, Sanders argued, to save the young people that Donald Trump just deliberately imperiled. When pressed, she could not parrot this talking point often enough:

Donald Trump and company want you to believe that they "wrestled" with this issue all weekend, trying mightily to empathize with people who arrived in the United States as children and are now staring down a return to a faraway country in which they likely have few connections, little history, and a very uncertain future. But if he really did give a shit about the consequences of ending DACA, and if his only concern about it were the legality of implementing it through executive action, then in theory, asking Congress to codify the program would be a fairly straightforward solution—a procedural tweak to a policy that Donald Trump otherwise supports. Instead, Sanders insisted that any legislative lifeline to permit-holders be attached to a comprehensive immigration-reform effort.

Who knows what such a proposal might eventually include: statutorily mandated deportations, or attempts to limit funding for sanctuary cities, or onerous restrictions on legal immigration, or whatever else might constitute the type of nativist fantasy behind which the president and this Republican-controlled Congress could throw their enthusiastic support. But his most audacious pledge remains unchanged since he announced it over two years ago: Donald Trump wants his precious wall, and although that cause has become kind of an unpopular albatross during his presidency, DACA'spopularity means that he and Republican leadership have happened upon a powerful bit of leverage that could help them deliver on their party's campaign promise. You can imagine how it might play out behind closed doors. Yes, Democrats, we'll agree to spare these innocent people from deportation. Just get the wall built, and we have a deal.

Keep an eye on this as the debate over DACA recipients unfolds during the next six months. Reneging on this country's promises to undocumented children is despicable by itself. But using their fates as political bargaining chips in an effort to fund Donald Trump's comically useless and wildly expensive vanity project would be a new low for this administration, and that's saying something.

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